Pau perfect for Davidson.

Anthony Davidson followed up his maiden British Formula Three Championship win at Croft a week ago with victory in the most prestigious international event of them all yesterday [Monday].

The reigning Formula Ford Festival champion dominated the FIA International F3 event around the picturesque Pau street circuit in southern France, beating the cream of Europe's junior racing talent in the process.

Davidson, still driving an unsponsored Dallara-Mugen for Carlin Motorsport, albeit sporting British American Racing Honda logos for the first time, was in a class of his own throughout the meeting, which vies with Macau and Zandvoort for the honour of top F3 race of the year.

After breaking the lap record in qualifying to take pole position on Sunday, Davidson proved to be untouchable in the 45-minute race, as he opened out a nine-second advantage and repeatedly broke the lap record on his way to victory. The current series leaders from the British, German and French championships had nothing to offer as the 22-year old sprinted away, and the traditional series of incidents ensured that Davidson was never challenged.

"It was a tiring race, although it is such a good feeling to win in this company," he said afterwards, "The Carlin guys cannot believe it. I made what I think was the best start of my Formula Three career and treated the opening laps as though it was a qualifying session. It meant I was able to break away from the pack quite early on and race at my own pace."

It was an outstanding result for the Hemel Hempstead driver, who has now taken two major victories in the last two weekends. In his wake, French series frontrunner Ryo Fukuda underlined his promise by taking the runner-up slot, ahead of surprise podium visitor Bjorn Wirdheim, the Swede racing ore usually in the German series.

Expected pace-setters from the French championship contrived to blow their chances of a decent home result by joining the list of spinners headed by Matthieu Zangarelli, while Davidson's Carlin team-mate Takuma Sato was assessed a jump-start penalty before retiring with mechanical problems.